COTUIT MOVIES – Freedom Hall was a popular place for silent movies in 1915, six of which are advertised out front with a sign reading, “Show Tonight.” Nellie Sturges Smalley played the piano and Ernest Dottridge ran the projector. The photo also shows an outside staircase that allowed the Masons to meet on the top floor. It no longer exists.

Freedom Hall spruced up as demand for use increases

Freedom Hall on Main Street in Cotuit harkens back to an earlier day as the center of civic life, Masonic meetings, local and national entertainment, silent movies, square dances and recreation for the youth.

Built in 1860 just preceding the Civil War, it may have been so named because of the strong village support for the freedom of slaves. On Feb. 4 that year, Selectman Charles C. Bearse asked the selectmen to consider building a public hall. Nine days later, a plan and a constitution was adopted for “a suitable place, free for all well disposed persons to assemble in, and hold meetings, lectures, parties, assemblies, levees, lyceums, etc,” according to Images of America, Cotuit and Santuit by James W. Gould and Jessica Rapp Grassetti.

The lot cost $100. The building’s design was a tribute to Athenian democracy, and probably done by Charles Bearse, while James West was the likely builder, according to a 2012 article by Gould for the Barnstable Enterprise.

The $1,400 cost of the hall was paid in $5 shares, principally from whaling captains Seth Nickerson, James Coon, Bearse and summer residents, Congressman Samuel Hooper and James Parker, who chipped in $100 to $200 each. It has proven to be a good investment.

Now, 153 years later, after serving so many uses and several years of inactivity, Freedom Hall is again in demand.

“We are getting all kinds of interest,” said Laurie Hadley, a member of the Cotuit Fire District Prudential Committee, which is in charge of maintaining the building. She cited a recent high school reunion, a wedding, a Masonic overflow clambake, a church that wants to meet there weekly, as well as the regular Boy Scouts and fire district meetings and as Cotuit’s voting place.

Such interest in the building has prompted the prudential committee to spruce up the hall, Hadley said. On Sept. 20, contractors came to look at the interior and decide if they wanted to submit painting bids.

The Greek Revival style building’s exterior has been painted, mold and other problems in the basement have been rectified, and a new gas heating and air-conditioning will soon be installed, Hadley said. “The hall had been neglected,” she added. Taxpayers support the fire district, which owns the hall.

The improvements are the latest in Freedom Hall’s many transformations. Hadley, who grew up in the village as Laurie Campbell and lives in her grandparents’ house, recalled, “When I was a kid, the hall was used a lot for plays and minstrel shows. We played basketball here, had Friday night square dances and dinners. There was a kitchen years ago.” The Masonic Lodge, which is now housed next door in the former Union Church, met on the top floor that was accessible by an outside stairway, she said. That floor is no longer accessible.

Frances Parks, prudential committee chairwoman, who also grew up in the village, said she “vaguely remembers” dinners in the hall basement, penny sales, minstrel shows, talent shows, and the Girl Scouts meeting there.

The large main room on the first floor is useful for large functions. The wood floor was good for balls and dance classes and the small stage for a range of entertainment, from poetry readings and skits by local talent to national lecture circuit performers and speakers. Famous ministers Everett Hale and Phillips Brooks spoke at the hall.

Use of the building is dictated by the district bylaws, Parks said. These state that local and nonprofit groups whose activities are consistent with the character of the hall and the village may use the building at no charge. Others pay a “reasonable fee.”